Random things

The closest weather gauge has the rain at almost an inch (it's now 2:22 pm), and I believe it: the side of our yard, against the house, is flooded.  A sudden increase of wind kicked up as well (and it was quite warm, though the temperature has since dropped back to the low 60's.)  We seem to be in this pattern lately of getting a month's worth of rain on one day.  I  don't mind the wind, but I hope the rain lets up a little, I have a gig shortly.

After, ended up bidding at the auction...happily lost on the mandolin, someone told me later he thought the frets were off, sounded like an easy enough fix if you knew what you were doing, but I don't.  Guess, I'll still learn the banjo, then.  Ended up with a very colorful (chaotically so), 70's style, afghan for $10 because no one else bid on it.  Always wanted one, and it's getting cold at night again.  I might pay a little more when I give them the check, also ended up with a clutch purse from the 60's or 70's, and a loaf of bread.  It was a fundraiser for the Finnish church where we rehearse.

(Apparently, it did get warmer when the back end of a hurricane passed through.  It's still breezy, but the rain has let up.)

Went to a puppet show last night, raunchier than last time I went, and stretched the definition of puppetry.  There was a workshop today, but I couldn't go because of the singing gig. I'd like to get more involved in it.   I like puppets.  (In my mind, circus/puppet/clown/mime, etc., all kinda' live in the same world.)

And in other clown news, a bunch of clowns rallied to save a block of Belltown slated to be redeveloped and succeeded in getting landmark status for one of the buildings mid-block: Well done!

Ah, this blanket makes me happy.

Chance of snow

Fighting off a virus, watching the very bright blue sky, feeling the sun reflect from the windows across the way onto me and wondering if it will snow today.

I need to come up with a task related to something I'm passionate about, that keeps me from being "a girl of summer," which my character is not.  Food.  Cooking.  Travel.  Art.  Photography and performance art, in particular.  Spain.  Nature, in particular birds.  Plants, trees, medicinal nature of things.  Religion/spirituality/philosophy.  Singing and music.  Storytelling.  Food and justice issues.  Altruism and the finding of common ground.  Books/reading/writing.  I'm sure there are others.  Last night I was like, "I don't know: nothing."  What would make a good engrossing task?  What would keep me out of trouble, keep me from being a "summer girl?"  Ah...and what am I wearing?  Need rehearsal clothes. 

We're not getting into context of the play at this point, but when I was in college, I did another scene from this playwright (N. Richard Nash), and on the surface she's a similar type of no-nonsense (Katharine Hepburn played Lizzie Curry in the Rainmaker) character.  (That would be the other time I kissed someone on stage, a friend of mine, a man that time...and only once.)  It's actually a kinda' cool transformation for the character (the "I'm pretty" scene, she sees her value through an outsider's eyes), but at the time I just thought it was corny.

It will be at or below freezing all week which is cold for here.  I have to sing tonight, should probably not wish for snow...still, I do.

Evocative

Something about the weather.  Low, loose, gray clouds, the type that sometimes move enough that you can see the blue sky underneath.  Sputtering drops of rain, warm enough.  I want to go camping.  Or travel.  Or work outside (for a while.)  And I want to be with other people doing these things.  Standing around drinking coffee, decided what to do next or waiting for the right moment to begin.  Just the weather. Evocation.

Sometimes walking past a tree, the sun warming the needles, I'm suddenly 8 years old and chasing around with all the neighborhood kids at dusk (we played "SWAT".)  Or the smell of laundry detergent and it's a gray, winter, Saturday morning and I'm 10, and my friend and I are riding her Radio Flyer wagon down the hill, steering with the handle; or I'm in my grandma's house in El Paso, and it's hot, we take the bus to the military base and eat deep-fried burritos and drink grape-flavored punch.  The back of my legs stick to the seat of the bus.

When I do guided meditations, the memories come through visual or tactile senses, but in waking life, they come through scent and weather and sound.  They catch me unaware, all of them, how do I drop in them on purpose?  Quickly, if I need to?  How do I blow those out to create an emotional response not specifically related to the actual memory?  How do you create an emotional truth not reliant on a memory?  How do you make it real enough to affect everything you do going forward?

I was wrong about the clouds.  They increased, the sky darkened, and it's a complete downpour.  It's a pleasing sound on the leaves of the camellia, but I'm glad to not be outside right now.

Now that spring has arrived

it's snowing! Big freaking flakes, dropping like a curtain. Had the strongest wind of the year earlier this week as well. It was a pretty uneventful winter, weatherwise, and now that it's no longer winter, we are getting a little bit of everything, as if Mother Nature suddenly woke up and shook out her satchel of tricks.

Well, that's that. Time to make myself move along now.  Here's a random picture of street art in Lisbon. Has absolutely nothing to do with anything in this post, I just really like it.




Lisbon-Street Angels/L.Herlevi
 

December 4, 2009

I guess Mother Nature missed the weather memo, hee hee: It's pouring down rain outside. All the weather forecasts were for fog, lifting to a sunny afternoon, no chance of rain for probably a week. Oddly it's only really showing on the radar in a very small band covering Seattle, and west to the Olympic Peninsula. Not cold enough for snow, though.

On a more serious and sadder note, Amanda Knox was convicted of all accounts in the murder trial of her roommate Meredith Kercher in Italy. I don't know whether or not she is guilty, but I don't think she should've been convicted by the evidence (knife didn't match the wounds -and of course fingerprints would be on a knife if you ever did any cooking- and footprint didn't match the shoe) and the grandstanding of the DA. While I'm sorry that Meredith Kercher was murdered, accusing the nearest person/s doesn't necessarily get you anywhere closer to the truth or closure. Best of luck on the appeal. Sorry for the downer.

Behind today's Advent Calendar window is a chocolate dipped cardamon ice cream bar from the Whidbey Island Ice Cream Co. You can find them at the Ballard Farmer's Market from 10-3 pm every Sunday, as well as various locations on Whidbey Island. In addition to a variety of ice cream bars (see menu here, which isn't complete, http://www.whidbeyislandicecream.com/Flavors.html) they also sell pints. I believe the bars are $3.00 and the pints $5 or $6. I was vacillating between the cardamom and a wine bar, but had recently tasted pullah, a cardamom-laced Finnish sweet bread, and have been craving cardamom ever since. I ate the same flavor two weeks in a row. Sometimes you just want what you want, like always ordering the same thing at a restaurant, because the reason you go there is for one particular dish. I always eat the vindaloo at my favorite restaurant, so many dishes untried until the next time when I consider the menu, vacillate, and order...the vindaloo.